Input states for quantum gates

Abstract

We examine three possible implementations of non-deterministic linear optical cnot gates with a view to an in-principle demonstration in the near future. To this end we consider demonstrating the gates using currently available sources such as spontaneous parametric down conversion and coherent states, and current detectors only able to distinguish between zero or many photons. The demonstration is possible in the co-incidence basis and the errors introduced by the non-optimal input states and detectors are analysed.